When I was in high school, my friends and I would go record shopping at the Music Staff in Westfield every Friday afternoon. One of our objectives: Buy an album by an artist we'd never heard of, either on the basis of the cover, or the group name, or the choice of fonts, or something else ridiculous. Bragging rights went to the person able to divine quality from sketchy circumstantial evidence.

If I hadn't yet heard of Glen Rock's own Titus Andronicus  very possible in the days before the Internet  teenage me would definitely have taken a chance on "Local Business." Check out this tracklisting, which was just released by the band today (the album comes out Oct. 23 on XL Records):

Ecce Homo
Still Life With Hot Deuce And Silver Platter
Upon Viewing Oregon’s Landscape With The Flood Of Detritus
Food Fight!
My Eating Disorder
Titus Andronicus VS. The Absurd Universe (3rd Round KO)
In A Big City
In A Small Body
(I Am The) Electric Man
Tried To Quit Smoking

Now how could that possibly be an uninteresting album? Pompous or overblown, maybe, but there's no chance it's dull. This looks more like a list of Donald Barthelme short stories than a rock record, and I mean that as a compliment. Check out the parallelisms, the diction and specificity, the references to literature and philosophy: Patrick Stickles has thought this all through. Moreover, following up a song called "Food Fight" with another called "My Eating Disorder" suggests the development of a (black) sense of humor that wasn't always evident on Titus Andronicus' first two sets. Finally, "Titus Andronicus Vs. The Absurd Universe (3rd Round KO)" is such a perfect title for a song by a band noted for its howls of existential distress that I'm a little surprised these guys haven't used it before.

And don't you want to find out which combatant wins by a knockout? If it was a Kanye West song, you know he'd be the one knocking out the universe. Chances are, frontman Patrick Stickles hasn't developed that kind of hubris yet, but a listener can always hope. Titus Andronicus was one of the few Jersey bands invited to play at Metallica's Orion Music + More earlier this summer; there, the Bergen County combo proved that self-flagellation could be just as aggressive as any of the vitriol dished out by the metal bands on the big stages. At that show, it felt like Stickles was fashioning his loathing into a weapon that could be pointed outward, too.

So, yes, I'm excited about this. Titus Andronicus is the leading light among a coterie of bands from Glen Rock and Ridgewood, and over the past few years, Stickles' combo has become one of the Garden State's best-loved rock exports. "The Monitor," the band's second album, was at least nominally a concept set  its references to the Civil War and Jersey history didn't exactly cohere, but they sure were evocative. Titus Andronicus backed that set up with concerts that felt like bloodlettings, and with a few cool videos that demonstrated Stickles' genuine love for New Jersey.

P.S.: Owen Pallett of Final Fantasy plays violin on the album. This won't mean anything to most pop listeners, but those who recognize the name are likely to check out "Local Business" for that reason alone.